[Reader-list] Necropolis: rehearsing Koltes in such times....

[OISHIK SIRCAR]

*Necropolis: rehearsing Koltes in such times....*
**
*dedicated to the 60th Birth Celebrations of Bernard-Marie Koltes *
**
a play by Best of Kolkata Campus

direction and dramaturgy: Parnab Mukherjee

inspired from In the Solitude of Cottonfields by Bernard Marie Koltes
additional text: Yulembam Ibomcha, Prabal Kumar Basu, Thangjam Ibopishak,
Rajkumar Bhubonsana, Bhaskar Chakraborty and Rabindranath Tagore

(Necropolis is a part of a three part repertoire called The Trilogy of
Unrest...the first two of them also Best of Kolkata Campus productions'  are
Hamletmachine: Images of Shakespeare-in-us and Raktakarabi-an urban sound
opera.
 Collaborations: Janardan Ghosh, Partha Majumdar, Gautam Bajoria, Rohit
Singh Rana, Gopika Jadeja, Hitesh Tekchandani, Aankhi Majumdar,
communityscope, Oglam, Sailpik, Insomnia, Suha Chakraborty, Amruta, Swati,
Aditi, Shilpa, Renee, Sanjeev and Anjan Dasgupta.
The repertoire tours north-east, Siliguri, Kolkata, Delhi, Jaipur Pune,
Mumbai and Gangtok. The touring performance will culminate in the release
of a special commemorative edition of Five Issues on Indian theatre and
subversions-dedicated to Badal Sircar, Vijay Tendulkar and Arambam
Samarendra. A special booklet on Towards an Indian Shakespeare will also be
published for the occasion. Both these publications have been curated by
Best of Kolkata Campus)

*at Earthcare Books, 10 Middleton Street, Kolkata-71 (Inside the premises of
Drive Inn...next to Middleton Chambers and exactly opposite OLD Kenilworth
hotel)*
*July 5, Saturday, 5.15pm*
**
**
**
*Synopsis: *
 Two men meet on the street. They have to make a deal. Or rather they want
to make a deal. One has something to sale and the other needs something to
buy. The Dealer is unsure what to peddle or would he want to peddle anything
at the first place. The Client knows what he has to buy but does not know
exactly what to buy. A cat and mouse begins between these nameless,
faceless, shapeshifters who has to make a transaction which they are not
sure why would they do it. For the next chunk of minutes they indulge in
selling and buying of concepts without transacting anything.
What are they selling? Or rather who is buying.....Is
technology, displacement, memories, genocide road-map of the
universe..becoming so routine that we have lost the power to engage with
them and provide a soothing balm to the displaced, destitute, fried,
barbecued, roasted, killed human-folk.
More often than not we are groping for words to describe routine violence.
Routine cases of racial profiling. Of exclusion. Grappling with stereotypes.
Cliches. Biases on the basis of human rights. On ethical treatment of
animals who become globalised pharma companies experimental guinea pigs.
Biases on the basis of sexual orientation. We are looking at images and we
think either they supplement the words or complement them. Is image only a
memory tool? Is it just a visual metaphor? Is it just to learn things by
heart? By rote

>  What is a perfomance?  Merely a text or an improvisation or  a series of
> theatre exercises which are prescribed as typical workshop methods
> The performance probes into the image -word relationship ....gets into into
> the rationale of images..........
>
   What images are we looking at? Nelllie-Morichjhaanpi, Malom, Mokokchung,
Nandigram...
What was the process of transforming the "us" into "them".....How are "they"
celebrating diversity and "their" culturalness in these times?
The performance negotiates these terrain.
By the time..the performance ends..nobody has bought...nobody has sold..yet
those two individuals have transformed themselves enough to be probably up
for sale if the next set of clients gatecrash into the narrative
the play explores the idiom of solo performance with city-specific
collaborators who intrude, alter and tamper the natre of the
performance..yet there is an unified thread that runs through
these structured improvisations....

*Best of Kolkata Campus: *
Best of Kolkata Campus-a performance company has completed 15 years of
doing dedicated campus theatre in found spaces and public arena. It has
produced a number of young theatre workers' who are active in the cultural
and audio-visual training arena. It is a loosely formed collective
of individuals who believe that theatre is an important an independent tool
of dissent outside the ambit of party politics. Some of the most memorable
productions of the group include *Hamletmachine*, *Antigone*, *Raktakarabi-an
urban sound opera*, *Bhul Rasta*, *Kasper-dipped and shredded*, *They Also
Work*, *River Monologues'*, *Dead-Talk series, Coversations with the dead,
Crisis of Civilisation, Shakespeare shorts, Man to Man talk, Inviting Ibsen
for a Dinner with Ibsen* and *And the Dead Tree Gives no Shelter*
The group also works in the field of installation performances and
theatre-of-conflict-resolution and peace studies. It has extenstively
travelled all over the country doing shows, giving workshops and exploring
alternative performance idioms.



-- 
OISHIK SIRCAR

Scholar in Women's Rights
Faculty of Law, University of Toronto

oishiksircar at gmail.com
oishik.sircar at utoronto.ca